LITTLE ROCK — The nearly 2-year-old eStem Public Charter High School received conditional approval Friday to move into a renovated bank building across the street from its location in the old Arkansas Gazette building in downtown Little Rock.
The Arkansas Board of Education’s 7-0 vote to support the move hinges on the school’s obtaining a building lease of no more than $350,000 a year, and other terms that are no less favorable than its current building lease.
The state Education Board acted on matters pertaining to the eStem high, middle and elementary schools at a meeting in which it also unanimously approved Little Rock School District plans to make Cloverdale Middle School a conversion charter school with an aerospace technology theme.
In conjunction with its move into the former Federal Reserve Bank at 123 W. Third St., the eStem high school received permission from the board to raise its enrollment cap from 400 to 500 students in grades nine through 12.
The eStem middle and elementary schools, which will stay in the old Gazette building at 112 W. Third St., also asked to increase their enrollment caps.
The Education Board raised the enrollment cap at the middle school from 396 students to 500 students. But it voted 4-3 against increasing the elementary cap from 360 to 495 students, citing the school’s failure to meet state minimum achievement requirements on literacy tests last spring.
John Bacon, executive director of the eStem schools, told the board that amendments to the eStem charters were needed to accommodate student growth.
“This is a critical, very exciting time in our organization,” Bacon said. “We are proud to say that within about 19 months, we are bursting at the seams in our facility.”
The three schools serve 943 students, of whom 48 percent are black, 42 percent are white and 10 percent are of other races or ethnicities, he said, adding the schools have a more diverse enrollment than the general public perceives. Thirty-two percent of students at the schools qualify for free and reducedprice school meals, which is an indicator of low family income.
While 676 students, or 71 percent of the total enrollment, come from within the city of Little Rock, 59 percent of those live south of Interstate 630 and 54 percent live east of University Avenue. A total of 123 students come from North Little Rock, 34 from Jacksonville, 43 from Maumelle, 35 from Sherwood and 32 from outside Pulaski County.
The schools have about 2,500 students on waiting lists, Bacon said. That includes 1,447 for the elementary school, 1,056 for the middle school and 83 for the high school, which currently serves ninth and 10th grades, and will add 11th grade next school year and the 12th grade in 2011-12.
The Little Rock SchoolDistrict last week submitted a letter opposing the increased enrollment at the three charter schools. The district argued that the state is obligated to review the impact of the independently run charter schools on desegregation efforts in the three Pulaski County school districts.
The letter, signed by School Board President Charles Armstrong and attorney Khayyam Eddings, says black enrollment at the eStem schools dropped from 54 percent in 2008-09 to 48 percent this school year. The percentage of students eligible for subsidized meals fell from 39 percent to 32 percent over the same period.
The Little Rock district’s enrollment is 69 percent black, and 70 percent of students are eligible for free and reduced-price meals.
Education Board members didn’t specifically address the Little Rock district complaints, but board members Brenda Gullett of Fayetteville and Ben Mays of Clinton told Bacon that a comparison of eStem test scores to Little Rock district scores was not an “apples-to-apples comparison” because of the different poverty rates.
Education Board members had reservations Friday about moving the high school to the old Federal Reserve Bank Building without a lease to review or anything in writing to show family or business relationships between theschool’s operators and the property owners.
Instead of a lease, the charter school operators and the property owners, Southern Realty I Inc., provided the board with a “binding commitment to lease real estate”document that proposed rent of $350,000 a year, subject to adjustments. Southern Realty I Inc., is described in the “commitment to lease” as a wholly owned subsidiary of Southern Bancorp CDC.
John French, president of Southern Realty, told the board that it would be “impossible” to set an exact rent figure right now because the final renovation costs are unknown. There is a possibility the rent could be reduced if building owners can get tax credits for rehabilitating the building, because it’s on the National Register of Historic Places.
“I’m just worried about the precedent of approving your move to a new facility without us approving the lease,” board member Sam Ledbetter of Little Rock said. “In my experience we’ve always had a lease in front of us and not delegated that [review] to our counsel. If we do it with you guys we create that precedent and we need to treat everybody the same.”
Jess Askew III, board chairman for eStem Public Charter Schools, responded that $350,000 is a high estimate of the potential rent and suggested the board set it asa cap.
“We understand the position we put you in when we come without a lease and we are willing to do whatever we can to give you comfort and allow you to do your duty to make sure we operate within fiscal guidelines,” Askew said.
Regarding the board’s vote to deny increasing the enrollment cap at the elementary school, Ledbetter noted that the school didn’t meet achievement standards. It would be contrary to the intent of the state’s charter school legislation to lift the cap, he said. The stated intent is to hold charter schools accountable for meeting measurable student achievement standards.
Black students as a group did not meet the state achievement level required for literacy. Bacon said last year’s fourth-grade teachers have been replaced, a reading specialist employed and curriculum changes made as the school tries to raise the literacy scores this year.
The Cloverdale AerospaceTechnology Conversion Charter School, to serve about 700 pupils beginning in the 2010-11 school year, calls for raising the percentage of students scoring at proficient or better on state literacy tests by 17.13 points a year, and the math achievement by 14.26 points per year.
Plans are for the school to test students at the beginning and end of the school year to identify academic needs, and use intensive targeted instruction, goals and rewards, and parent assistance in the homes to meet its goals. Students with academic deficits will be pulled out of regular nonacademic core classes to be provided remediation in math and literacy.
All teaching positions at the school will be declared vacant and the principal will hire new staff who are committed to the program. No more than 49 percent of the current staff can be rehired.
Arkansas Education Commissioner Tom Kimbrell told the state board that the Cloverdale program “shows boldness and commitment.”
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 7 on 02/20/2010